The first of the pioneer families of St. Chad's was that of Thomas
Hunter and Harriet Crisby.

St. Chad's was once the winter quarters of Salvage families for wood cutting.

Eastport Peninsula: St. Chad's

Damnable Bay as a place-name first appears in printed form on the Bonavista Bay
chart of Holbrook in 1816. It was probably named for bothersome navigational
conditions in the days of sailing vessels. Other explanations prevail in local
folklore. The name, for example, is often pronounced as "Damn the Bell". "Damnable"
is usually the written version, though a few sources used the name "Dangerous Bay".
The head of the bay contains a comfortably sheltered cove within an area which was
once well-timbered, a good place where a few families from Salvage (Hunter,
Martin/Crisby, Troke) once overwintered and eventually settled. They were later
joined by families from Sailors Island (Lane, Moss), Wild Cove (Rogers) and Flat
Island (Hiscock). The shore side of the cove is rather rocky and rugged, containing
only a few small terraces, gentle slopes and hollows suitable for dwellings and
gardens. The relief and physical limitations severely restricted the size of
settlement. The name Damnable was changed in the late 1890s to the more pious St.
Chad's at the behest of the Reverend T.M. Wilson.

The first of the pioneer families of St. Chad's was that of Thomas Hunter
(1837-1905) and Harriet Crisby (1842-1899). They arrived with sons George and
William and daughters Elizabeth Ann, Jessica and Louisa about 1893. Their move
from Salvage was recalled by grandson Thomas in the Stagehead (1978). He says:

"My grandfather was the first man to come to
live here. They lived there in the bottom of the cove ... They had a studded house
built like the old people use to have fore now. Well, they lived in her for winter
and summer for I don't know how many years. And then they started and built a house
here...".

Hunter related that St. Chad's was then a veritable forest with plenty of timber
and firewood but that "about 66 or 67 years ago" the place was burned out with only
two houses saved. This was, of course, the same forest fire that ravaged Squid
Tickle and Halides Cove in May 1912, an event that was later commemorated in the
name Burnside. The fire effectively destroyed the wood resources around these
communities. In its aftermath some moved away to places such as Grand Falls. Those
who remained relied upon the inshore and Labrador fisheries and supplemented these
activities by going to the spring seal hunt or logging away from home. William
Martin, for example, the principal local entrepreneur, operated a sawmill at Broad
Cove in Newman Sound after the fire and also sent a schooner to Labrador.

According to Burden merchant ledgers of the 1880s and 1890s, dealers such as
Thomas Hunter and John Martin of Damnable and the Hunters (James Sr. & Jr.,
Joseph and John) of Halletts Cove relied much on wood products (such as bundles of
hoops and birch rind, wharf sticks, fire wood, flake longers and railway sleepers)
to settle their accounts for food and supplies. Evidently the Burdens acquired a
contract to supply wood materials ties during the construction of the Newfoundland
Railway. The opportunity to cut railway ties may have been a major reason why both
St. Chad's and Burnside attracted families into permanent residence in this period.
These same families, however, continued to operate in the fishery during the summer
months and most continued to regard themselves primarily as fishermen. By the 1950s
a large proportion of the male labour force of St. Chad's and Burnside were
engaging as carpenters in construction around the province. In recent decades
Burnside and St. Chad's have been favoured more as places for maintaining second
homes and holiday cottages by erstwhile urban dwellers rather than by young couples
to raise families. In consequence both have experienced population decline.
Burnside's association with archaeological research and interpretation of
Aboriginal sites in and around Bloody Reach (the Cowpath) has given this community
a new cultural and heritage dimension of some valuable consequence.